Malicious Websites?

[angels_]

Alright so I ignored it for a little while but tbh starting to get tired of it

Every time I press the "Play Game" button and log in, it opens a new window, usually saying "You have a virus!", "Adults only game", "You have won ___!" and various other malicious scam or adware-style popups. I do run adblock, yet I still see these things.

I get these on literally NO other websites. I've run virus protection programs (three of them) including avast, malwarebytes and malwarebytes adware remover and got jack, so I'm almost 100% sure that I don't have a virus, and if I do, it's pretty well hidden and is VERY picky about the way it works, because I literally only get it here, and I only started getting them recently (I've been on Feralheart quite a number of years).

So, if this is some kind of ad thing that this website recently got that no one is regulating? Does anyone else get these popups JUST on that screen? Or do you think I might have a virus just burrowed deep into my computer somewhere?? Because if these are from the Feralheart website and not my own computer, I'm probably not gonna be very happy.

And, any way I could possibly get rid of them?

[Azurain]

Oh no, it's happening to everyone. Some not as frequently as others, but it does happen. It's just something that has to be done and honestly the only thing you can stop it is with adblock's, but as you already stated it doesn't really work. May be hard to do and just frustrating to deal with, but just keep closing those tabs and try not to click on anything they open.

[angels_]

Oh no, it's happening to everyone. Some not as frequently as others, but it does happen. It's just something that has to be done and honestly the only thing you can stop it is with adblock's, but as you already stated it doesn't really work. May be hard to do and just frustrating to deal with, but just keep closing those tabs and try not to click on anything they open.

This makes me a bit angry. I mean, if they're worried about that kind of stuff, I'm sure they can put something in to get around adblock users, such as not being able to use the site if your adblock was enabled. Plenty of websites use it.

And the fact that this is unregulated is ridiculous to me.

So, we're not allowed to cuss or discuss mildly mature content because it's "Not safe for kids", but we can have a big (usually noise-making!) pop-up ad with malicious content that a young user may fall for? So that they can damage their parents computer? And make it to where their parents believe the game has a virus, and then don't let them play anymore?

If Feralheart were to remove this, I would be quite happy to turn off my adblock, but honestly this damages my trust for the website and the game. It's not cool.

[Azurain]

Yeah I understand it all but the ads are needed to keep this site running without having to pay to use it. And plus, nobody has any power what ads show, so there is nothing anyone can do there.

[angels_]

Yeah I understand it all but the ads are needed to keep this site running without having to pay to use it. And plus, nobody has any power what ads show, so there is nothing anyone can do there.

I'm pretty sure you DO have the power for what ads show... Take a look at almost any professional website with ads. There most likely isn't going to be pop-up ads screaming "YOU HAVE A VIRUS. CALL THIS HOTLINE NOW TO FIX IT, TOLL FREE" in my ears.

You don't just GET ads. You have to go to a company or a provider to put them on your website (such as google ads?). And if the company providing the ads is malicious, you get these kinds of ads. They got in contact with some kind of company to put ads on their site, and I'm pretty sure that the pop ups weren't an accident.

Pretty sure the ads are doing more harm than good, and I'm sure I'm not the only one irritated at this.

[Azurain]

Well, if you would like to really talk more about it, I suggest you PM Razmirz about it and talk to him. He runs the site so you may get better responses from him rather than me or anyone else. ^^;

[Vilivikhorith]

Alright so I ignored it for a little while but tbh starting to get tired of it

Every time I press the "Play Game" button and log in, it opens a new window, usually saying "You have a virus!", "Adults only game", "You have won ___!" and various other malicious scam or adware-style popups. I do run adblock, yet I still see these things.

I get these on literally NO other websites. I've run virus protection programs (three of them) including avast, malwarebytes and malwarebytes adware remover and got jack, so I'm almost 100% sure that I don't have a virus, and if I do, it's pretty well hidden and is VERY picky about the way it works, because I literally only get it here, and I only started getting them recently (I've been on Feralheart quite a number of years).

So, if this is some kind of ad thing that this website recently got that no one is regulating? Does anyone else get these popups JUST on that screen? Or do you think I might have a virus just burrowed deep into my computer somewhere?? Because if these are from the Feralheart website and not my own computer, I'm probably not gonna be very happy.

And, any way I could possibly get rid of them?

If your machine was indeed infected, that virus would do whatever the programmer of said virus had intended, and something tells me such a programmer would have more nefarious ideas than making you see annoying advertisements on an online game.
Since you have ran several scans with no hits, it seems possible to assume the advertisements aren't 'malicious', just annoying/spammy. Advertisement companies (if they are of any worth to their clients) will attempt to filter out adverts with malicious payloads. It's bad for their business. As long as it wasn't one of those ads that like, sends you a suspicous looking executable, it probably wasn't deemed dangerous by someone.

As for making them go away... Well, for whatever reason, I have yet to see any of these ads. My current setup is Chromium, (version 58.0.3029.19), Stands Fair-Adblock, and in addition, I block javascript on most websites (since it can be used to create said malicious payloads.). If you are paranoid as I am, I suggest something similar.

I have seen in (some) circumstances that clients can control the content of advertisements displayed, but of course, that portion is up to someone else to change, if it is possible with this company.

[angels_]

Alright so I ignored it for a little while but tbh starting to get tired of it

Every time I press the "Play Game" button and log in, it opens a new window, usually saying "You have a virus!", "Adults only game", "You have won ___!" and various other malicious scam or adware-style popups. I do run adblock, yet I still see these things.

I get these on literally NO other websites. I've run virus protection programs (three of them) including avast, malwarebytes and malwarebytes adware remover and got jack, so I'm almost 100% sure that I don't have a virus, and if I do, it's pretty well hidden and is VERY picky about the way it works, because I literally only get it here, and I only started getting them recently (I've been on Feralheart quite a number of years).

So, if this is some kind of ad thing that this website recently got that no one is regulating? Does anyone else get these popups JUST on that screen? Or do you think I might have a virus just burrowed deep into my computer somewhere?? Because if these are from the Feralheart website and not my own computer, I'm probably not gonna be very happy.

And, any way I could possibly get rid of them?

If your machine was indeed infected, that virus would do whatever the programmer of said virus had intended, and something tells me such a programmer would have more nefarious ideas than making you see annoying advertisements on an online game.
Since you have ran several scans with no hits, it seems possible to assume the advertisements aren't 'malicious', just annoying/spammy. Advertisement companies (if they are of any worth to their clients) will attempt to filter out adverts with malicious payloads. It's bad for their business. As long as it wasn't one of those ads that like, sends you a suspicous looking executable, it probably wasn't deemed dangerous by someone.

As for making them go away... Well, for whatever reason, I have yet to see any of these ads. My current setup is Chromium, (version 58.0.3029.19), Stands Fair-Adblock, and in addition, I block javascript on most websites (since it can be used to create said malicious payloads.). If you are paranoid as I am, I suggest something similar.

I have seen in (some) circumstances that clients can control the content of advertisements displayed, but of course, that portion is up to someone else to change, if it is possible with this company.

Thanks so much for the suggestion to block javascripts. It honestly never crossed my mind to do so. I'll try it out and see if it works for me, and if so, I might try and block javascripts JUST for feralheart, assuming this type of advertising continues.

Thanks for informing me a bit more about the companies and such though. Only thing is, though, I'm a bit worried about someone who isn't as educated in the whole "not clicking advertisements" thing can get a nasty virus from this type of advertising. As in, it's incredibly misleading, and since this website and game has a focus on being kid friendly, this was probably a very bad choice in dealing with adblock problems, and I hope they change it to be a bit more user friendly sometime in the near future.

[Vilivikhorith]

Thanks so much for the suggestion to block javascripts. It honestly never crossed my mind to do so. I'll try it out and see if it works for me, and if so, I might try and block javascripts JUST for feralheart, assuming this type of advertising continues.

Thanks for informing me a bit more about the companies and such though. Only thing is, though, I'm a bit worried about someone who isn't as educated in the whole "not clicking advertisements" thing can get a nasty virus from this type of advertising. As in, it's incredibly misleading, and since this website and game has a focus on being kid friendly, this was probably a very bad choice in dealing with adblock problems, and I hope they change it to be a bit more user friendly sometime in the near future.

yeah, those kinds of ads are most definitely aimed at the less computer-savvy. They come off as a great shock, to entice users.  When the ads are put into this context (a website of mostly untech-savvy users) it seems much worse, simply for the shock factor towards said users, if nothing else. A bit of an oversight in my initial reply.

[G4RG0YLE]

What you see of these malicious websites are not able to be controlled whatsoever, I'd like to make that clear. It's not supposed to be able to be controlled either, and that is not a decision made by the Staff team at all, but whoever created these on-click-adverts made it so. The reason why they were implemented was to help pay to keep the Staff up and running - it isn't expected of anyone to do what is said on that website, but it is strongly advised that you close it. The Staff cannot control what you see on these ads, that's the problematic side of the whole concept, but it's in the responsibility of parents or friends to tell the uneducated to close these malevolent tabs, not ours. The only thing we can actually do is advise them if they question it in a Help Thread, and if they've made a mistake that's given them a virus from clicking within the ads, help them also remove it.